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Walt’s bread turned out fine. It wasn’t pillowy and delicious with yeasty holes like Hollis’s was. It was dense and almost like cake, but it soaked up his ma’s white gravy well enough that no one made them answer any hard questions.

Mr. and Mrs. Brown were watching a black-and-white movie, and Walt lingered on his way up to Hollis’s room.

I saw this in theaters, he said.

I figured. What’s it called?

The Third Man . It’s funny how well it’s held up. You never really know what things people will latch on to in the long run. This wasn’t even the most popular movie of that year. Samson and Delilah and Pinky were the ticket. No one mentions those now.

“You want to sit down? Casting a long shadow, june bug.” Mrs. Brown tilted her head backward to smile at Hollis upside down.

“Nah,” Walt said. “Some other time.”

Walt walked them up the stairs in the dark, and Hollis tasted his loneliness.